Haley resurfaces Trump remarks mocking veterans in new ad

GOP presidential candidate Nikki Haley’s latest ad showcases former President Trump’s past remarks mocking veterans as she attempts to ramp up her campaign ahead of the South Carolina primary later this month.

Haley’s campaign released the roughly 90-second ad Monday, after Trump took aim at Haley’s husband for being absent; he is serving in the military overseas. The ad includes snippets of news reports discussing past remarks from Trump, including him reportedly calling soldiers who died overseas “losers” and “suckers.”

The ad highlighted Haley’s response to Trump’s attack on her husband, who was deployed to Africa in June last year with the South Carolina Army National Guard.

“Donald Trump had a rally today and in that rally, he mocked my husband’s military service. And I’ll say this: Donald, if you have something to say, don’t say it behind my back, get on a debate stage and say it to my face,” she said Saturday at a rally in South Carolina, which is featured in the ad. “I am proud of Michael’s service. Every military spouse knows it’s a family sacrifice.”

“I have long talked about the fact that we need to have mental competency tests for anyone over the age of 75. Donald Trump claims that he would pass that. Maybe he would, maybe he wouldn’t. But if you mock the service of a combat veteran, you don’t deserve a driver’s license, let alone being President of the United States,” she said.

The ad includes other past remarks, like Trump joking about then-Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) for being a prisoner of war by saying in 2015, “I like people who weren’t captured.” It also included Trump in 2018 attacking retired Navy Adm. William McRaven, who oversaw the 2011 raid that killed Osama bin Laden.

“Donald Trump has a long track record of insulting our veterans,” Haley national spokesperson Olivia Perez-Cubas said in a statement. “He has no business being commander in chief.”

Haley said on CBS’s “Face the Nation” on Sunday that Trump’s comments about her husband were “insulting to military families.”

“This is about what it says to every military family who sacrifices alongside of them. We can’t have someone who sits there and mocks our men and women who are trying to protect America,” she added.

When reached for comment on the ad, Trump campaign spokesperson Steven Cheung defended the former president and took aim at Haley.

“There has been no bigger fighter for our military men and women than President Trump. Nikki Haley likes to talk about her foreign policy chops, but bowing down to China and advocating for forever wars by sending our troops into unnecessary conflicts represent America Last policies she is so fond of,” Cheung said in a statement to The Hill.

–Updated at 12:26 p.m.